World Bank holds back on Thai hydro scheme

The World Bank has postponed payment of a £32 million loan to Thailand, to complete a dam across the Mool River, until it has examined new data on the project's design and impact. The move follows a study by the US Agency for International Development, which proposed that the US should not support the dam because environmental impact studies by the Thai authorities in the 1980s were 'flawed'.

Conservationists have applauded the decision. They argue that the 300-metre-long, 17-metre-high dam barrage will ruin rice production on 800 farms, devastate fish stocks in the river and could introduce schistosomiasis to the area. The disease, also called bilharzia, is caused by a blood fluke which is carried by waterborne snails. The fluke burrows through the skin and causes chronic debilitating disease.

Construction work has already started at the dam site 570 kilometres northeast of Bangkok. When finished, the project will generate 136 ...

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